Dynamo appeal to international population of area

1of 3Dynamo defender Abdoulie Mansally, from Gambia, shows off skills at media day Tuesday.Photo: Bob Levey, For The Chronicle

2of 3Fans Wally Elarusi, left, and Btian Thorpe cheer on the Dynamo during a match against New England in 2014 at BBVA Compass Stadium. The Dynamo have enjoyed a devoted following since they moved here.Photo: Eric Christian Smith, Freelance

3of 3Dynamo coach Owen Coyle applauds his players who had offers from domestic and international teams but stayed in Houston.Photo: Bob Levey, For The Chronicle

In late January, the Dynamo signed David Rocha, a former captain of Spanish league squad Gimnástic de Tarragona, a 102-year-old club in a small port town on the Mediterranean Sea.

When Rocha began practicing with the team, Tyler Deric greeted him with a warm welcome. And the wrong name.

"I called him David Rock for the first three weeks," Deric said. "One day he came up to me and goes, 'It's Rocha! It's Rocha!' "

Rolling R's aside, the correct pronunciation of the veteran midfielder's family name is Row-cha.

"I was thinking, 'Oh my gosh, I've been saying it wrong for three weeks now,' " said Deric, a Houston native who is so much a Texan his name is John Tyler, and his brothers are Austin and Chase.

Rocha toyed with Deric's embarrassment by joking that instead of using the standard pronunciation of the Dynamo goalkeeper's name, he was going to start referring to him as "Tee-ler."

That is the type of squad the Dynamo say they expect to be, a fun-loving group that won't let names and language keep them from coming together.

An international team in an international city.

One in four Harris County residents is foreign born. With 11 of 27 players on the roster born outside the United States, the Dynamo are much like Houston.

"Houston is a big-time city - it's a melting pot for all different cultures - and we have a big-time team," Deric said. "We are accepting of everybody that comes here - all races, religions, you name it - as long as you have a good attitude and you come to work, you're more than welcome with the Dynamo. Just like Houston."

The Dynamo, who begin their 2016 season Sunday at BBVA Compass Stadium against the New England Revolution, have players who were born in Brazil, England, Spain, Honduras, Argentina, Colombia, Gambia, Nigeria and Mexico.

"It is important to learn different cultures and soccer allows you to meet different people from different countries and come together as one team," Dynamo midfielder Boniek Garcia said.

Soccer skill is more important to team chemistry than nationality. If the Dynamo win, they will be loved.

The Dynamo have a sterling reputation as a first-class organization, a championship organization, but they are coming off a second consecutive eighth-place finish and they missed the MLS playoffs for just the third time in 10 seasons.

"The bar is set high," Deric said. ""We understand that we've gotten away from it, and we want to get back to being that team that other teams fear."

Dynamo fan enthusiasm hasn't waned despite a couple of subpar years, but there hasn't been the growth you would expect, particularly considering the continued expansion of youth soccer.

The MLS isn't yet strong enough to carry this franchise to the next level.

"Soccer in this country is growing; we have the wind behind us," said Gabriel Brener, who in December bought out AEG to become majority owner of the Dynamo. "There is a lot of soccer popularity, but not a lot of it lands on Major League Soccer, unfortunately, but soccer awareness is huge. Now we've got to work at MLS to develop the best product possible so that we can have that audience migrate to us."

That goes for the Dynamo, too. These are no longer Oliver Luck and Dominic Kinnear's Dynamo.

General manager Matt Jordan was active this offseason, acquiring 11 new players in four trades and six free-agent signings. He did all he could to upgrade the team's talent, finding players wherever he could.

This year, the Dynamo should be faster and more dynamic. So long to the sluggish Dynamo we have watched the last couple of seasons.

"Youth and pace are the two things that come to mind when I look at this team," said London-born captain Giles Barnes, who joined the Dynamo four years ago. "What we've got now is an exciting, fast-flowing team that's going to give the fans something to shout about.

"Dynamic is a good word to describe it. We've got legs all over the park."

Translation: speed.

The question is how quickly the team will jell.

Coach Owen Coyle, who is from Scotland, said he can see a togetherness already.

"There are a number of these players that had clubs all over the world interested in them, but they wanted to be here, which is great for us," Coyle said. "We have a magnificent stadium and support that is second to none, and as much as we've brought new players in, the best example is the existing players that still wanted to be here, the Giles Barnes, the Will Bruins, the Tyler Derics, the Ricardo Clarks.

All of them had offers from other teams in the MLS, in Europe and abroad, but they wanted to stay here.

"They realize what we're trying to put into place. These things take time to come into fruition, but the building blocks are in place. This team is solid."

Jerome grew up in downtown Acres Homes, Texas. He is a proud graduate of Mabel B. Wesley Elementary and was a basketball team captain at Waltrip High School, where he helped the Mighty Rams to a near-.500 record.

A math genius and engineering major in college, he's still working on this writing thing. He says that the three years he spent as an F.M. Black Panther probably played a more significant a role in the man he would become than the time he spent in college.

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